Airlines are down to squeezing blood from turnips, adding seats, overbooking flights, charging for meals. It has created an environment where travelers feel battered and bullied. Finding ways to ease that discomfort is a human response.

And that condition came about because it was what airline customers wanted.

Back in the olden days when airfares were heavily regulated by the government, airlines couldn't effectively compete through offering lower prices, so they competed through service. Once airfares were deregulated, however, what the public overwhelmingly wanted was cheaper airfares rather than superior service, so that's what they got: the lowest airfares possible, at the expense of virtually all ancillary services.

Between the fact that air travel has reached the point where you need an extra vacation to recover from it when you go on vacation and the financial situation that many of the major carriers have been in since 9/11 (or before, not sure when it really started), it doesn't look like either side actually came out ahead.

Once airfares were deregulated, however, what the public overwhelmingly wanted was cheaper airfares rather than superior service, so that's what they got: the lowest airfares possible, at the expense of virtually all ancillary services.

I wonder if it will eventually swing the other way. The next time I fly I plan on researching which airlines give you a few more inches. I don't care much about the lost meals, but it's gotten to the point where I'd prefer to pay more than endure hours in a cattle crush.

It can't be the person buying the seat next to it since then that person is on the manifest twice.

If you buy an extra seat, you are not on the manifest twice. One of the main reasons for the manifest is to allow the captain to work out the "all up weight" of the plane. A few empty seats counted as passengers would throw out the calculations. The reservation is done differently, but you are only named once.

But more importantly, in an emergency, it is to allow rescuers to know exactly how many people are on a flight. They don't want to waste time looking for the second Bill Smith when he has already been rescued.

I wonder if it will eventually swing the other way. The next time I fly I plan on researching which airlines give you a few more inches. I don't care much about the lost meals, but it's gotten to the point where I'd prefer to pay more than endure hours in a cattle crush.

Jetblue has 34" of legroom, as compared with the industry standard of 31", though they're planning to knock an inch off next year to cram in a few more seats. They also have Even More Legroom seats with 38" in the first few rows, which you can purchase for an extra fee; it varies by length of trip, but I think it's up to about $90 extra now for a cross-country flight. Worth it, IMO.

Now that they have reduced us to very little space, I wish airlines would stop allowing seat reclining.

Spirit Airlines does this, as does Ryanair in Europe, but both of those airlines squeeze the seats even closer together than normal, using a seat pitch of 29" compared to the industry standard 31".

Quote:

Originally Posted by Esprise Me

Jetblue has 34" of legroom, as compared with the industry standard of 31"

"Seat pitch" technically isn't the same thing as legroom. It's the distance between a given point on one seat and the same point on the seat behind it. That is to say it includes the seat itself. It can give you a rough idea of whether one airline offers more legroom than another, but it's not a perfect measurement. If two airlines have the same seat pitch but one uses seats with thinner backs, then that one will have slightly more legroom. But the thicker seat backs might be more padded and more comfortable, so it's sort of a matter of preference.

Spirit Airlines does this, as does Ryanair in Europe, but both of those airlines squeeze the seats even closer together than normal, using a seat pitch of 29" compared to the industry standard 31".

"Seat pitch" technically isn't the same thing as legroom. It's the distance between a given point on one seat and the same point on the seat behind it. That is to say it includes the seat itself. It can give you a rough idea of whether one airline offers more legroom than another, but it's not a perfect measurement. If two airlines have the same seat pitch but one uses seats with thinner backs, then that one will have slightly more legroom. But the thicker seat backs might be more padded and more comfortable, so it's sort of a matter of preference.

As a general rule of thumb, similar aircrafts of similar vintage will have similar seats (but not always mind you), and seat pitch is a reasonably good approximation of the "crampness" of a plane.

Personally I think that "seat distance" would be better measuring factor (from nearest point of seat in front to nearest point of next seat, ie: back ot seat to front of next seat). But that's not how they do it.

As a general rule of thumb, similar aircrafts of similar vintage will have similar seats (but not always mind you), and seat pitch is a reasonably good approximation of the "crampness" of a plane.

I don't disagree that it's a reasonably good approximation, but it's really not that uncommon for airlines to refurbish the cabins on older aircraft if they're planning on keeping them in the fleet for a while, so I disagree that you can assume the same plane of the same vintage will have similar seats (yeah, I know you said "not always"). United has been updating all their A320s with a new type of seat, for example, so they now mostly have completely different seats from Delta's and JetBlue's A320s.

A method commonly used by airline passengers to get cheaper fares is at the center of a court row between a German airline and one of its customers.
Lufthansa has taken a passenger, who didn't show up for the last leg of his ticketed journey, to court in an apparent bid to clamp down on "hidden city" ticketing.

The article also specifically mentions the case that prompted this thread to begin with:

Quote:

Back in 2014, United Airlines and Orbitz filed a civil lawsuit against 22-year-old Aktarer Zaman, who founded the website Skiplagged.com, which helps travelers find cheaper flights by using the "hidden city" strategy.
The case was thrown out in 2015 after the judge in the Northern District Court of Illinois said the court didn't have jurisdiction over the case because Zaman didn't live or do business in that city.

Didn't realize it had been thrown out on jurisdictional grounds. Bummer.

There was an incident that made the "buyer beware" section of one of the blog websites.

Paraphrasing here, but someone tried to do the hidden city thing by flying from New York to Atlanta, to Oklahoma, to Phoenix, getting off at Oklahoma (or some route similar to that).

New York to Atlanta was good, but while in the air, the plane from Atlanta to Oklahoma was cancelled due to a weather event.

The passenger was then rerouted Atlanta to LA, then LA to Phoenix, bypassing Oklahoma altogether.

Passenger was unhappy and complained that the airline was not flying him on the original route. He stated that if he had known he was not flying through Oklahoma, he would not have boarded in New York.